Monday, May 7, 2018

Why the Classically Designed Garden is Today's Modern

At the front end of designing your garden there's a common halting point.  Language.  No words to describe the form, function, style, flow, Nature, abiding your life to house to garden, and etc.  There are layers of meaning in what is lost.  A trinity of margins listed, above.  Life happens in the margins. 
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Somehow, that language is in your soul's DNA.  Once heard, immediately, "Of course."
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Several generations of Americans have grown up with foundation plantings needing harsh pruning, lawns needing toxic fertilizers/chemicals, annuals swapped 2x/year, put it on contract, mow/blow/go. 
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Back to language.
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What Garden Design language do you see, below?
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Made me smile seeing this pic.  Have seen 100's of gardens designed in this manner.  Humble cottage, to manor born.
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If you had to label this Garden Design, below, what are your labels?  No worries, it's your head/heart, and those labels may be far better than mine. 


Alexander Cameron, Virginia Woolf, and Leonard Woolf stand outside Bowen's home. Bowen's Court (Cork, Ireland), 1934
Pic, above, here.
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Garden Design, above, Gravel to the House, Formal, Wildwood.  Margins at house to garden, gravel to formal, formal to woodland.
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A trinity of Garden Design styles, a trinity of margins.  Where margins meet, pop.
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Beyond intuiting classic Garden Design, above, decades ago, I was a slow learner about its true depth of purpose.  Do you know what I'm about to say about this style?  Go you, hope you do, Earth is a better place for you knowing it.  And I'd adore knowing how you learned it, intuited it, how old you were at the time.
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Classic Garden Design, above, is also designed for maximum pollinator habitat, Wildwood next to open meadow. 
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House & Garden are one, Vanishing Threshold. 
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Another value to Classic Garden Design?  No toxic fertilizers/chemicals, less maintenance, lower HVAC expense, increased property value. 
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Ironically, classically designed gardens are unique in every permutation.  Guaranteed. 
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More, classically designed gardens are 'fast' to 'show'.  Instead of a decade, or more, classically design gardens are felt/seen upon completion of gravel, planting, etc. 
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Sustainable, eco, organic, pollinator habitat, potager for yard to house, and other buzzwords, each contained, inherently, in Classically Designed Gardens. 
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Classically Designed Gardens are Today's Modern.
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Garden & Be Well,   XO T
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Already spot Virginia Woolf, above ?  Cannot count the times I've read, To the Lighthouse.  Look forward to reading it many times more.
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Decades gardening classically, a new layer was reached, without anticipation, once I got chickens, 8 heirloom chickens.  I scoop their poop from the coop daily, and toss around plant margins, not atop the roots.  Cannot imagine, decades missing out on this.  No regrets, at least I know it now.
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Once Chickens arrived to my garden I also gained a gift, a change in perspective, away from merely  'gardening' to one of Stewardship.  The honor of Stewardship.  Washing of the servant's feet.
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The door of Stewardship is all encompassing.  In every good way.   

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